“Take care, Bianca.”
Eric’s smile faded the moment Bianca walked out. His face, already pale, looked even weaker under the light.
At that moment, the door opened again. Hadley walked back in. She sat beside the bed and looked at him closely. “Was she here to test you?”
“Yes.” Eric nodded, his brows drawn tight.
“Then…” Hadley hesitated, knowing his siblings weren’t exactly friendly. “Are the others suspicious too?”
“Not likely,” Eric said, shaking his head. “They’re not all from the same mother.” Bianca, for instance, was Gifford’s biological sister. She had just gone through a divorce and returned to the Scott family, now bent on backing Gifford in everything.
“They each have their own agendas,” Eric added, the worry evident in his voice. “But if it serves them, they might set those aside. Just long enough to come after me together.”
The words hit Hadley like a cold wave, and her anxiety spiked to dangerous levels.
“What are we supposed to do now?” she whispered, her voice trembling.
“Hey, don’t let panic take over just yet,” Eric said, his tone steady and reassuring. “They’re working on pure suspicion right now—they don’t have a shred of actual evidence. My medical files and treatment history are locked down tight under confidentiality laws. Those people assumed you and I were at each other’s throats and figured they could stir up some serious drama. But their little scheme just crashed and burned, and without any real proof backing them up, the board members won’t give them the time of day. They’re basically powerless to cause any real damage.”
“But what if…” Hadley’s worry gnawed at her insides.
The brutal truth was staring them in the face—his condition was deteriorating by the day. Sure, they could bury the medical records deep enough, but there was no hiding the relentless march of his disease. Time was slipping through their fingers like sand, and Hadley wondered desperately how much longer he could keep up this charade before his body gave out completely.
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“Can’t we just… walk away from all this mess?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
The Scott family’s endless feuding—if the Scott siblings wanted to tear each other apart, why not let them do it without dragging Eric down with them?
“Listen.” Eric released a long, weary sigh that seemed to carry the weight of the world. “It’s way too late for that approach now… I’m already neck-deep in their twisted game.”
Walking away wasn’t an option anymore—not when he’d already chosen his side in this war.
“They were already going for each other’s throats like wild animals… but now that I’ve thrown my hat in the ring, they’re practically foaming at the mouth to destroy me completely.”
Eric let out a bitter laugh, knowing that Hadley couldn’t fully understand the dangerous waters they were swimming in.
“The Scott family fortune… it’s so massive it would blow your mind,” he explained, his voice taking on a more serious edge.
Decades of careful accumulation, combined with Ferris’ meteoric rise to power, had transformed their wealth into something almost unimaginable by the time Eric inherited it.
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